Remember when people used to send postcards? Back in the day, whenever you went somewhere special, you always sent a postcard home.
I still have some old ones from my grandmother’s time. She hailed from Heath, and her family moved to Shelburne when she was a teenager. She met my grandfather when she worked in Conway, just up the road from the Bardwell’s Ferry Bridge and the station on the Shelburne side.
My grandfather and father worked for the B&M Railroad at Shelburne Junction and Bardwell’s Ferry, and in the early 1900s, mail went out by train a couple times a day. Regularly, my grandmother, my aunt, or Uncle Fred, who lived in the Boston area, would send a postcard just to say hello. Sometimes the card would say “Will send a letter by the next post.” My aunt and her friends liked to collect postcards, so they’d send them from every place they went, like North Adams, Hartford, Conn., and New York City.
When I worked at an antique shop, I once saw a postcard from Sing Sing Prison. Who would actually want to visit a prison for fun? I suppose it was a novelty to show the rows of cell blocks and mess hall, empty of prisoners, of course.
When we went to Florida one winter in 1960, we sent postcards home from Tampa and Clearwater, as well as ones from the Ringling Brothers fancy mansion in Sarasota. I sent a postcard of an alligator to one of my school friends. One postcard I remember showed a diver with his “catch” of sponges.
My mother used to buy postcards when she went on trips. She brought some home with her and sent them to her granddaughters years later. She was particularly fond of Scotland, so I’m sure there were some cards of heather and kilted Highlanders in her reserves.
Today, there are still plenty of postcards, however I see most people taking selfies on the Bridge of Flowers and putting them on Facebook and Instagram. I’ve even taken some for visitors with their fancy phones. But, when I look through the old postcards in my box of treasures, I can’t help but think of those days when you could send a card for a penny or two, with the address simply “Bardwell’s, Mass.”